Robots, in Disguise?
by antepathy
Summary: Barricade has been given a 'special' Halloween mission by Starscream. It involves dronelings. He's not amused.  More or less silly crack


A/N Yeah, just some holiday-themed crack that hopefully is amusing :D

The plan had to be the stupidest thing Barricade had ever heard. Well, probably not the stupidest—he automatically disqualified anything Brawl suggested. But normally he expected just a little more, you know, smartnesses, from Starscream. Which showed him what happened when he allowed himself to expect things.

New expectation: This was some twisted sort of revenge by the jet. Barricade had, well, you know, somewhat strongly implied that the jet's aft was a bit wide.

Well, it was!

Still, revenge or just plain stupidity, this had to be the worst plan ever. And of course, the worst part of the worst plan ever Starscream had gleefully handed off to Barricade, his mouthplates grinding together in avian happiness as he gave the orders and the datapad, after he 'd looked over Barricade's briefing.

Which had landed Barricade…here. In a room full of dronelings, their white optics wide and innocent and stupider than Starscream's aft was fat. He was not in the mood for dronelings. Not that he ever was.

"Salutations, Honorable Instructor Barricade!" the room rang as the drones singsonged the protocoled greeting.

"Yeah, whatever," he muttered, stomping to the front of the room. Fifty pairs of optic followed him—fifty heads swiveling on twenty skinny necks—as he walked, and then fifty heads dipped as he leaned over to sync his datapad and queue up the input rod. A sad, sad day indeed when even the blind hero-worship of dronelings failed to move him.

"Right. Now pay attention," he said. Which was a little unnecessary in the circumstances—the one thing drones could do was pay attention. TOO much attention, sometimes. "Got a mission for you."

A stir of excitement and happy blurpings. "Oooooo!"

"Stop getting excited, dronelings. This is a dangerous mission." And stupid. Did he mention stupid?

A visible, grunting effort as the dronelings struggled to dampen their enthusiasm. A claw popped up. "As dangerous as that mission where you had us grease the floor in the airframes' corridor?"

Now, you see? That had been a non-stupid plan. Not only non-stupid, but downright fraggin' hilarious as Starscream had been the first to amble down it. Barricade had to give the jet points for effort, if not style, agility, or grace, as the long arms had pinwheeled wildly, the feet slipping, tapping, skidding frantically in the zero-friction grease. And then the long, slow slide (on his aft) down the rest of the corridor, his body turning in a graceless spiral around his _weighty _aft before he finally came to a stop at the corridor's end, right in front of the crew of working dronelings who had gawped at the humiliating spectacle. And then who had clutched each other in paroxysms of confusion as Blackout, attempting the same corridor but with only half as much style, bowled into the jet just as Starscream had regained his feet. Ah, now that was a plan, perfected in every detail.

Of course: it had been Barricade's plan.

This right here? Starscream's. Which meant it sucked.

"Even more dangerous. We're bringing you planetside."

Aaaaaaand the excitement surged again. Another claw. "Will we get to crush filthy, disgusting squishies?" The optics were spiraled out to their maximum aperture in anticipation.

The others clicked and chirped eagerly ."Can I poke one's optics out?"

"Can I stomp one into paste?"

"Can I fingerpaint with its life-energon?"

See? Even dronelings could make a plan less filled with suck than Starscream. Suckscream. Seriously. Alas, no. They had to go by the Air Commander's scintillant plan. Rank had its privileges, and one of them was apparently the ability to foist suck onto others.

"No. Our mission requires stealth, so…no squishy-stomping."

"Awwwwwww!" the mass of dronelings wailed, their white optics whirring unhappily.

Barricade waited, grumpily, for the noise to die down. Yeah, he hated it, too. Stomping would at least have made him feel better. However. "Our objective is to acquire a specific kind of human energon, called 'Halloween candy'."

"What's that?" A sea of curious faces turned to him, sensing New Knowledge. The one thing dronelings lived for more than anything.

Barricade consulted his datapad. "Not really sure, which is why we have to get a sample to test it. It's part of some bizarre ritual so we presume it to be, a, uh, 'formidable weapon'?" Right, this was the last time he let Starscream 'revise' his mission briefs. He was already dreading the appendices.

"What kind of ritual?"

Barricade could hear a few of them clicking open new shells for data. Frag. He read from Starscream's notes. "'A supplicant, dressed in a scary costume, knocks on the door of a human domestic habitation. When the door is opened, he utters a ritual phrase, and…apparently gets this special energon in return." On the briefing display screen, a crude animation of a wireframe droneling went through the motions. The screen showed a close-up of 'knocking' and then three, quick, red-lined animations of what not to do: tear the door off its hingest, knock with one's feet, or shoot the door.

The dronelings blinked, entranced. One or two curled their claws and made knocking gestures in the air, practicing. "What's the ritual phrase?" one asked, breathless with excitement.

Barricade shrugged, squinting his lower optics at the transliteration of the strange human words that popped onto the display screen behind him. "Looks like 'trickytreat'?" Stupid phrase.

One droneling cocked its head. "Triggertreat?"

Huh, that sounded much better. Clever dronelings.

Another bounced excitedly. "I know! Trick a tree!"

The other dronelings turned to the one who had called out. "Tree?"

"It is an organic vegetable life-form," the droneling said, smugly, showing off its knowledge. "With leaves."

"How do you trick one?" another droneling asked.

The droneling faltered and turned a pleading pair of optics to Barricade. "Ho-honorable Instructor?" Its systems hummed in distress.

Barricade rolled his optics. "Look. Trees don't matter." Seriously. Except as things that burst into satisfying amounts of flames. "There's no actual tricking going on besides the fact that it is us using their own means to acquire their special energon 'candy'."

"Trick with the scary costumes?" the pleading droneling asked, determined to regain its equilibrium.

Barricade nodded, gruffly. At least someone was bringing them back on task. And where one droneling went, the rest tottered after. The droneling chirped, pleased with itself again.

"What kind of costumes are scary?" one asked. "What will we be disguised as?"

Barricade consulted the datapad. The next slide flicked up. Barricade froze. That hadn't been in his briefing! He'd already picked their costumes: they were going to go as ghosts. He even had the prefabbed white tarps drawn up. "Uhhh, you can…think of your own?" Drones, thinking? A dangerous combination. Starscream would have to be Gotten Back Good for this one. Meddling with the Intelligence Officer's briefing slides had to be a capital offense. Or would be, as soon as Barricade wrote the new rules.

"I know! Optimus Prime! He's the scariest thing ever!" One droneling turned to the others, flexing its little claws, pitching its voice low. "GIVE ME YOUR FAAAAAACE!"

The others bleated and shrieked, huddling together in fear.

"Stop that," Barricade snapped.

The droneling froze, automatically. It drooped its head, arms flopping to its sides. "But it was scary?"

"Yes, fine. You were scary. Look at how scared they are. But the point is you're supposed to be scary to squishies, not dronelings."

"Oh!" Fifty droneling cortexes subsided into thought.

After a moment, a claw popped up. "Honorable Instructor Barricade? What sorts of things scare squishies?"

Well, apparently Barricade, if the Witwicky boy was any indication. But Barricade really didn't want a horde of dronelings dressed as him invading the town. Ghosts. They were going to be ghosts. And that was it.

Another slide popped up—a mosaic of images of human Halloween costumes from a human website called KustomKostoomz. The dronelings chirped and clicked, crowding in to study it. Barricade ratcheted Starscream's Inevitable Death up a level of Needless Violence.

"What's a…'Freddy Krueger'?" one asked.

Barricade turned to the square the droneling was indicating. He had no idea. And when in doubt, improvise. "He's, obviously, a mech that got mostly turned into a squishy." They blinked. "Uhhh, that's what happens when you don't pay attention to your briefings."

"Ooooooh! That is scary!" the dronelings cooed. Yeah, he thought so. They riveted their optics back to the screen.

Another lit up another box. "I do not understand why this one is scary, Honorable Instructor?"

It was labeled 'Naughty Nurse', and featured a female squishy in a short white dress that did not quite close across her chassis, and some garment on her legs that did not reach the dress's short hem. And the most ridiculously teetery footplates he'd ever seen. "Uhhh, it's like Flatline, only scarier. And that's gotten too big for its armor."

The dronelings bleated, a few of them clutching at each other. Flatline was scary! Well. Good to know, apparently, that he wasn't the only one to find the 'scientist' a little on the freaky side.

"This looks dangerous," one droneling said, quietly, optics scanning the screen worriedly. "I am scared by this mission."

"Oh," a new voice cut in, Starscream, rolling around the edge of the doorframe, from where he'd obviously been eavesdropping. His arms were folded over his cockpit, his face amused. "It is very scary, little droneling. Positively terrifying. Which is why, in his infinite kindness and…honorable-ness," Starscream smirked, "your Instructor has volunteered to accompany you."

What?

The dronelings cheered, bouncing, clicking and whirring happily, their optics admiring on Barricade. Who frowned a Frown of FLAMING Thermonuclear Death at the large jet. "Um, no."

"No?" The clicking died down, abruptly, the little eager faces falling. "But…we need you!"

"You do not need me. You're Decepticons."

He heard their distressed whines and glared them down. Starscream might be immune to the Frown of Flaming Death—dronelings were not. They quailed.

"Now, now, little dronelings." Starscream stepped into the room, blocking the line of sight from Barricade to his charges. "The only reason your Honorable Instructor is balking is he can't figure out which costume he should wear."

Dronelings did not get humor. Not that Starscream's 'humor' was all that slaggin' funny. Nor, unfortunately, could they detect bald-faced lies. Barricade leapt to one side, lunging for the connector of his briefing input rod. Starscream reached over, and slapped a broad, careless hand over the pad. "So, dronelings. What do good mechs do when someone in their cohort is in trouble?"

"I'm not in their cohort!" Barricade howled, outraged. He wasn't a slaggin' droneling!

"Help him!" the dronelings chorused, en masse, with the ringing proud volume of dronelings certain they had given the right answer.

"That is correct!" Starscream gushed. Fraggin' jet poured on the charm for the dronelings. Not for, you know, anyone who mattered. Like Barricade. "Now, dronelings. Let us help repay our wonderful instructor by picking out the scariest costume for him to wear!"

"Sit on a warhead, jet," Barricade muttered.

One droneling blinked. "That is not a costume!"

Barricade growled, prying his talons around the jet's longer, barbed fingers, desperate to disconnect the input rod. "Don't need a costume!" he shouted. But it was too late: dronelings had divided into little clusters, clicking and chirping as they debated the costumes. There was no tearing them away from their task. Fraggin' droneling programming.

A raised claw appeared over one of the clusters. "Air Commander? We have it!"

"Yes?" Starscream slapped his other hand over Barricade's, pinning him to the console.

"The nurse one!" Dronelings chirruped in agreement. Barricade groaned.

"No. No way. You are not getting me in that thing."

"Me?" Starscream said, innocently. "You are merely supervising your charges. And that is the costume they find the scariest. It is an…honor, Instructor Barricade."

The dronelings nodded, earnestly, frantically. "It is, Air Commander," they chorused. "He will be very scary in it," one added, helpfully.

Yeah, well, no doubt about that. Scary…and fraggin' ridiculous. And humiliated. "You wait till this is over," Barricade snarled. "I'll show you fraggin' scariest."

Starscream smirked, mildly. "I look forward to it."


End file.
